My inspirational text today is born out of a situation that occurred yesterday. As always, I feel compelled to write about it. Facebook – it is a blessing and a curse. It’s a curse because whatever you write becomes public record. It’s a blessing because you meet long lost friends and have the potential of meeting friends of friends. The latter would be the source of a Facebook war that should never have happened.
Here’s the story. I comically wrote a status about a clumsy mishap – I fell down. This is not a uncommon occurrence. Anyway, a Facebook “friend” that I never met made a snarky comment and instead of engaging in negativity I responded with, “why are you so mean? You must want me!”
It was a rhetorical question because he’d asked me out on numerous occasions over the last two years. I’d accept; however, something would always pull me back and it never materialized.
The conversation took a nasty turn. He threatened to copy and paste a conversation from 2011 in which he asked me out to dinner and I responded gleefully accepting.
Even though I wasn’t physically attracted to him, he was a seemingly intelligent and kind so I was interested and even excited for a change of scenery.
Despite his attempt to “put me on blast” he had very little material to work with and so it flopped. However, the whole scenario caused me to think about the company I keep. The scripture says, “evil communications corrupt good manners”. Some people will wait for a prime opportunity to reveal your supposed “skeletons”. Mr. Man had that argument boiling for a while and perhaps – if I am objective – I would have been angry too. Without argument, I strung him along instead of saying, “I appreciate the offer but I’m not interested.”
Every step we take in life is a learning experience and we should take responsibility for lighting the spark that starts the flame – no one in a conflict is innocent.
However, you can resolve that you will not become a prisoner of your past. Whatever your mistakes in judgement may have been, whatever failures you have had to come to grips with, and whatever heartache you have had to endure, it does not make up your present. It does not define your future. You have to make a conscious choice not to be black mailed or held captive by anyone’s opinions or memories.
Paul said “forgetting those things which are behind, I press…” (Phil. 3:13).
I choose to be effervescently and unconditionally happy. I just want to encourage you to do the same!
So what did I decide to do about my angry friend? I learned to use that fascinating button called “Delete”.
